The first edition of No Sleep Festival in Belgrade has sparked great interest with half of the tickets planned for this event sold after only three weeks of regular sales, even though there are still seven weeks left until the event! At the same time, for the second week in a row the number of interested people on the official Facebook event exceeds the entire capacity of the main stage and is constantly growing.

Even though general projections for the first year of EXIT’s new festival in Belgrade were a bit more moderate, it’s interesting to mention that the number of countries the visitors hail from has already exceeded 30, which is almost a half of EXIT’s number! No Sleep Festival organized by EXIT team, with the support of the popular domestic brand Guarana, will be held at multiple locations in Belgrade, while the superbly produced central events will take place at the New Hangar at the Port of Belgrade, which will welcome a couple of thousands of visitors to its industrial surroundings every night. On the first night, on Thursday, November 15, with the special “Warehouse Rave” performance, the legendary Fatboy Slim will open No Sleep Festival, accompanied by DJ Tennis and Marcelo Fengler, while the same place will see an intimidating crew of the most sought-after techno performers the following evening: Nina Kraviz, Dax J, I Hate Models, Aleksi Perala and others.

Club REX to celebrate 30 Years at No Sleep Festival 2018:

And now, the program for the third night at the New Hangar – on Saturday, November 17, the gigantic hall at the Port of Belgrade will be visited by the symbol of Parisian nightlife, one of the world’s most famous clubs, Rex, for the celebration of the 30th anniversary of its untiring existence! For this special occasion, they’ve picked performers that people here have been waiting for years, so the third night is to have not one, but two headliners – famous French duet Cassius and the living icon of the electronic music, Lee Burridge! A special guest of Rex club and No Sleep Festival, this legendary English maestro is the creator of what may be the most popular sound on the scene today, which connects house, techno and progressive in such way that it easily moves from minimal to a sound designed for the biggest stages. In his impeccable sets he leads the audience from a hypnotic dance, through real euphoria, all the way to real dreaming, which gave name to his always sold out parties – All Day I Dream (ADID)! From his Tyrant days, a collaboration which consisted of him, Sasha and Craig Richards, to releases for such labels as Global Underground, Innervisions, Hooj Choons and ADID, Lee Burridge remained one of the most influential DJs of the scene, and the famous Burning Man festival today practically cannot be imagined without his sets.

The Parisian duo consisting of Phillipe Zdar and Boom Bass are coming to visit for the first time, with a new album and numbers featuring Pharrell Williams and Cat Power. Alongside Daft Punk and Justice, Cassius are considered to be the most significant representatives of the extremely specific French house school and top stars of Ed Banger, the famous publishing house. They will be joined, also for the first time here, by famous Rex club resident and deep house heroine Molly, as well as the intriguing Pascal Walter, an experienced music selector from France who’s recently chosen Belgrade as his second home. The hosts of this party are Petar Cvetković who will open the event with a minimal deep set, and our famous DJ and producer Marko Nastić who will have the honor of closing the three-day program in New Hangar, the same place where he organized the big Retrospektakl this year and marked his first 20 years on the domestic and international scene.

Interest is growing: New ticket prices next week!

Due to great interest, the current ticket batch is almost sold out, so next batches are expected to be issued next week for higher prices. The current prices for No Sleep Festival are 2.590 RSD for standard tickets and 4.490 RSD for VIP tickets. The tickets are sold online at Gigstix.com and online at Nosleepfestival.com website. The festival tickets will be exchanged for wristbands which allow entry to all the parties, during the entire weekend spanning from Thursday evening to Sunday afternoon, from November 15 to 18, at multiple locations in Belgrade, starting from three big parties at the New Hangar at the Port of Belgrade, all the way to afterparties and daytime parties in famous Belgrade clubs such as Drugstore, 20/44, Šećer and others.

Dragana Kostica is the Belgrade-based editor in chief and founder of Still in Belgrade art, culture and club scene magazine. She holds a Master of Arts in Cultural Policy and Management in Arts (MA of Arts) and a Bachelor degree in Archaeology.